Four Wins

A Friday Hodgepodge

Open Bigotry as Opportunity

Letters from readers of Miss Manners and Prudence each show the potential value of meeting bigotry with a dignified response.

One of these letters, to Miss Manners from an American who frequently travels abroad, deals with a common complaint: people who make snide comments about "Americans" at our expense.

Miss Manners replies in part:

As such comments are almost certainly based on the age-old cliche that all Americans are rude or bullies, they ignore the hypocrisy that only rude bullies would offer such an insult to a guest in their country.

The proper response is therefore to silently, but politely, make clear that you know you have been insulted. If you can excuse yourself, do so. If not, look stern and ignore the speaker for a time. This forces others to question their assumptions both about Americans and about themselves -- which will be far better for you than getting into a fight in a foreign country. [bold added]

In the second letter, a reader contributes his perspective to advice she gave to a gay couple about possibly attending a family reunion together. He says in part:

[A]ll the times we calmly showed up and were just nice and pleasant had an effect on my whole religious family. They couldn't keep up the bigotry in the face of two decent and kind guys just living their lives authentically. My relationship with my parents became really close, and my nieces and nephews started telling their parents that they didn't want to listen to them bad-talking their uncle when they preached "love one another" in church, but then talk hatefully about their own brother.

...

I would tell the writer not to do anything they don't think they can handle or that would make them feel unsafe, but sometimes it is the simple act of showing up and being yourselves that brings people around and forces them to confront their bigotry. Plus, you never know which niece or nephew might desperately need to see you living your authentic lives to give them hope and courage to weather their own situation... [bold added]

This is a prime example of the approach Miss Manners advises paying off in getting people to overcome dehumanizing prejudices. (The corollary of politely letting an ass know you've been insulted is to enjoy the company of those who aren't going along with it.)

As the emphasis on safety in the second letter indicates, everyone must make a risk calculation about such situations, especially when they're avoidable, but standing up for oneself in the face of bigotry is a way to improve the world one lives in small, but appreciable ways.

-- CAV

Reparations: Still Unjust

Judging by the headlines in the New York Post, reparations for slavery are back in the news. This time, Alameda County, California, which notably contains Oakland, is considering cash payments to black residents.

The conservative outlet, predictably, is against the idea and, just as predictably, focuses on the impracticality of the idea and its historical absurdity, while sloppily conceding the moral high ground to its advocates.

California’s Kamala Harris, the first black female presidential nominee, also reportedly has a slave owner among her ancestors.

Is she supposed to pay reparations to herself?

This is humorous for the second or two before one realizes that the very premise that makes it humorous goes completely unchallenged, which is quite a price for a giggle.

By contrast, an older opinion piece by Brian Phillips goes for the jugular, starting with his title of "California Reparations Task Force: Fighting Injustice with Injustice." (The piece also addresses what I suspect is a big factual miss by the Post: The reparations might not even be about slavery, but about racist policies.)

Phillips's central argument is clear, straightforward, and refreshing in an era when the conservative movement has gone so far astray that it has been sighted in the weeds of economic illiteracy and corruption:

Justice demands that the guilty be punished and they make restitution to the victim. To give restitution to those who were not victims is to grant unearned rewards. To punish those who did not participate in an injustice is to penalize the innocent. Neither is an act of justice. Neither restitution nor punishment should be dispensed simply because of skin color. Yet, this was what the task force wants to do.

So, regarding that joke: What is Kamala Harris -- or anyone else -- supposed to do regarding "reparations" that distribute money looted from individuals to others, based on accidental membership in a group, such as a race?

Oppose that idea as the evil, unjust proposal that it is.

-- CAV

Mark Kelly in '28?

In The Atlantic is a lengthy profile -- over 6500 words -- of Senator Mark Kelly (D-AZ), who is contemplating a presidential run.

Based on his standing up to President Trump and Pete Hegseth last year regarding the impropriety of military officers following illegal orders and his subsequent legal persecution by the same, I have come to admire Kelly as among the few good men in politics in a position to offer meaningful pushback against Trump's authoritarian, lunatic administration.

I welcome this news.

While I hardly expect to agree with many of Kelly's political positions, given that he is a Democrat, the need to repudiate today's Republicans without ushering in a woke or socialist administration that would assume it had a mandate makes any sane Democrat worth a look.

Given the strong slant of the profile (and the lefty political slant of the publication), I took a look at Kelly's Wikipedia entry for that purpose, and find that while his political positions are far from ideal, they fall into the category of sane/tempered by facts/I could live with someone like that in office. As for the profile itself, I found it to be a mixed bag.

I was not thrilled to learn, for example, that a willingness to bend politics in the name of altruism is a major part of what got Kelly into politics in the first place:

... I asked Kelly what had made him decide to run for office. First off, he said, he was concerned about "the trajectory of our country with Donald Trump in the White House." This did not exactly make him a brave and lonely voice in the Democratic wilderness. But Kelly traces his particular aha moment to a get-out-the-vote rally that he attended in Phoenix before the 2018 midterms. A woman, probably in her 30s, approached him.

"She just stands next to me and says, 'Hey, my son has Down Syndrome. And I'm terrified he's going to lose his health insurance. Would you please consider running for the U.S. Senate?'" Kelly told the woman he would think about it.

This is not great, but it isn't Eat the Rich, either, and it's pretty culturally in the mainstream, which is (with only the rarest exceptions) what one has to expect of a politician today.

Much more compelling is Kelly's willingness to take a stand to protect our form of government:

Kelly keeps his official letter of censure from Hegseth taped to the door of his Senate office. I hadn't noticed it until he mentioned it to me. The document -- dated January 5, 2026 -- is addressed to "Captain Kelly" and printed on "Department of War" stationery. It is three pages long, one of them crooked. Kelly told me that he hung the missive sloppily on purpose, to reflect his lack of respect for its contents and sender. Perhaps, he said, he should smear it with ketchup.

I asked Kelly why he displays the letter on his door.

"I think that, you know, the seriousness of this whole thing," he said.

"It's good for me to be reminded of what's at stake, and who these people are." [bold added]

And, later:

Kelly made this clear to me too. If "they actually sent me to prison, I'll be fine," he told me. "I'll continue to fight back against these people."

I mentioned that it would seem unlikely at this point that Kelly would be sent to jail over the "illegal orders" video. The government, after all, already failed once to win an indictment against the lawmakers. Kelly agreed, but then went on to describe scenarios in which it could happen: If, Kelly suggested, his lawsuit against Hegseth goes to the Supreme Court and they rule against him, the Pentagon could then have other punishment options. "I could wind up in a nonjudicial punishment process in the Navy," he said. "And you know, that's a big pain in the ass."

"I tell you what they could do; they could try to indict us again," Kelly continued. "Then, maybe do it in a place where maybe they get enough grand jurors. And then I wind up getting charged with seditious conspiracy."

I joked that if Kelly did wind up in prison, he would probably raise $50 million within a week. He reiterated that he was not scared of imprisonment. His wife is not worried about it either, he said. [bold added]

Kelly is surely making a politician's calculation here to the effect that he would be able to raise enough of a public outrage to blunt the effects of such an effort. But this is hardly an easy way out and I see few other politicians willing to confront this Administration so openly.

I could probably support Mark Kelly for President. I am glad he's considering a run.

-- CAV

Murkowski vs. the SAVE Act

At the Wall Street Journal, Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) explains why she will be voting against Donald Trump's ill-considered and disingenuous attempt to federalize and overhaul American elections.

Many of her objections sound like those I raised in March, only greatly exaggerated by Alaska's peculiarities as new, far-flung state with a very low population density:

Or maybe you're a fisherman in Unalaska, out on the Aleutian Islands. The flight to Anchorage -- the closest election office, some 800 miles away -- would cost about $1,500 round-trip. You would also need a hotel, cabs and food while in Anchorage because it would be impossible to fly in, register and return home the same day.

These examples assume you have on hand the documents necessary to prove your citizenship. But take one more: You are an 85-year-old Native elder born in your parents' house, 18 years before statehood. Getting a certified copy of your birth certificate, especially if you have never had one before, would be incredibly difficult.

Previous comparisons of this proposal to a new poll tax are tame compared to the above.

But the fun doesn't stop there: Murkowski notes a few other whoppers most people probably have never heard of:

I've also asked for the effective date of the legislation to be pushed back to give all states enough time for implementation. As written, the bill would take effect immediately -- but it is unreasonable to expect immediate compliance.

This bill would force many states to modify their election laws. Some legislatures might need special sessions to do that. Thousands of local jurisdictions would have to implement new processes and find workers willing to risk being personally sued. Under the bill's private right of action, individuals or groups could sue election officials if they believe verification requirements aren't being strictly enforced.

Even if federal resources are provided through the budget reconciliation process to help facilitate these changes, it will take weeks or months for those dollars to arrive and much longer to overhaul state voting processes. [bold added]

Does the Trump Administration want to suppress voting? Is it grossly incompetent? Both?

Whatever the answer, if there is a bill that should be Dead on Arrival, this is it.

I recommend reading the whole thing.

-- CAV

Blog Roundup

A Friday Hodgepodge

1. "How About a Genuine America-First Policy?," by Peter Schwartz (PeterSchwartz.com):

The movement Trump launched claims that his policies will "make America great again." Here, too, there is a prior question that demands an answer: What made America great in the first place? And it's the same answer: freedom.

America's exceptionalism rested on the premise that each individual has rights, and that the task of government is not to rule him but to protect those rights, by leaving him free. In the 18th century, a world dominated by despotic monarchies, this was a radical view. America was founded not simply on the idea that the people ought to elect their government representatives, but on the more fundamental idea that the individual has inalienable rights -- rights that may not be violated even by the wishes of a majority.

785 words/3 minutes

2. "Are Taxes 'The Price We Pay for Civilization'?," by Jaana Woiceshyn (How to be Profitable and Moral):

[Author Carol Off's] paraphrased quote from the U.S. Supreme Court justice Oliver Wendell Holmes in the early 20th century: "Taxes are the price we pay for civilization," prompted my post. I wanted to challenge the premise that the tax-funded welfare state is the ideal civilized society. The focus here, therefore, is on the chapter about taxes.

Off sets up her defense of the welfare state with a false alternative: either we have a welfare state or a libertarian anarchy (which she equates with capitalism). She argues that the welfare state is ideal as the only social system that can achieve equality of outcomes for all, with the government collecting taxes from the productive and "redistributing" them to the less productive through various subsidies and programs.

865 words/3 minutes

3. "The Key to Sustainable Real World Results and Other Updates," by Jean Moroney (Thinking Directions):

When I see two mistakes of the same type, I look to draw a principle. Given that I've been teaching "motivation by love" (aka the value orientation) since my speech on the topic in 2019, I can talk for hours on the subject, and the principle is integrated into everything I teach in the Thinking Lab, how could I have been blind to these two major areas of threat orientation in my own life? The answer hit me at once: writing and time management are the two skills that I had given the most time and attention to prior to 2019. I had already put more than 20 years into understanding each of them before fully grasping the fundamental importance of a value orientation. This meant that my value hierarchy in these areas was integrated with mistaken beliefs about what was possible.

710 words/2 minutes

4. "Alan Greenspan -- Not a Eulogy," by Harry Binswanger (Value for Value):

[W]hile Alan Greenspan started out as a basically good man, he ended up as a traitor to capitalism, Objectivism, Ayn Rand, and his own soul. He went to Washington, and began to play the game. He chose the road of power.

Here are some points of acceleration in his decline. He "saved" Social Security by expanding its destructive power. At a State of the Union address, he rose up -- next to Hillary Clinton -- to join in giving a standing ovation to the call for universal (socialist) medical care. After the fall of communism, he refused to recommend capitalism to the newly freed regimes.

In the end, he abjured capitalism and, indirectly, Objectivism, as the logic of his premises required. He was an inexcusable blend of Peter Keating and Robert Stadler.

680 words/2 minutes

-- CAV

Taking Pet Adoption Seriously ...

... sometimes means not adopting at all.

A couple of advice columns dealing with pets reminded me of the time one of my brothers broke up with a girlfriend decades ago.

The straw that broke that camel's back: She came home with two yippy dogs without having consulted him about it.

I am not a dog person. I was sympathetic then, but it took me time to appreciate what a good move this was on his part. That wisdom has nothing to do with my preferences regarding dogs and I would go so far as to say that anyone who seriously appreciates dogs should agree with me.

Why?

Because some pets -- off the top of my head: anything dangerous, high-maintenance past a certain point, or large enough to have the run of the house -- inherently affect the daily life of the members of a household enough that everyone in the household deserves a say before making such a commitment. I can even see the argument that such pets demand a degree of commitment that is comparable enough to a human relationship that whether to adopt one is a major life decision.

Two advice columnists bear this out. In one case, a woman who works in an animal shelter has brought home so many dogs it is beginning to make her family's home life unbearable despite the fact that they all like dogs. In another case, one partner in a dog-loving couple appreciated that a new pet would not work for them at this time in their lives -- but her partner went ahead and brought home a dog, anyway:

Fast-forward: Butch is a sweet, loving pup. I adore him, but he's a ton of work. My fiancé is back in school and working so he's not happy stopping multiple times a day to take Butch out for air and exercise as the dog is an active breed. He does it, but some days are stressful for us both.

Abby, I resent him for this. We're both overloaded and now have another full-time responsibility plus extra bills. We love Butch but are overwhelmed. I would be miserable giving him away, which is what my fiancé now suggests.

Both columnists correctly advise their readers that finding a new home for a pet can be the best option, including being an improvement for the pet itself.

In each letter, it is clear that the writer sees the pet as part of the family and cares for it, which underscores that bringing a pet into one's home is a serious decision. (And conversely, when someone unilaterally does this, it is a red flag.)

On top of my positive point, the cultural baggage of altruism can make this harder than it needs to be: The pet needs a home. Lots of people will deem protecting one's own time and sanity, rather than sacrificing it to an unwanted pet, as "heartless," for example. Such ideas can lead to a bad decision motivated by inappropriate guilt or unwarranted pressure from others.

The discussion about whether to adopt a pet isn't the time for martyrdom, or giving in to an out-of-context desire to help an animal, or appeasing the rest of the family in the moment. Any such discussion has to be made with everyone's best interests in mind, especially those of the caregivers.

If someone truly cares for animals, they will not adopt one on a whim.

-- CAV